Brie Larson might be an Academy Award-winning actress with a billion-dollar superhero origin story under her belt, but she’s also ended up as one of the most widely-despised figures in superhero cinema, at least when it comes to a small and very vocal section of the internet. With that in mind – coupled with the franchise’s overall reputation – it seems unfortunately inevitable that Madame Web will suffer from a similar fate.
Questions have deservedly been asked over Sony’s strategy for building out its own Marvel universe, with everything except Venom and its sequel being eyed with something that exists between skepticism and disdain. Morbius was awful, Kraven the Hunter being R-rated might end up doing it a favor, but the likes of El Muerto and Hypno-Hustler don’t seem to have much of a reason to exist.
That leads us neatly onto Madame Web, and not to generalize, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out how trolls are going to react to a Spider-Man spin-off that comes bearing a principal cast led almost entirely by women. Speaking to Total Film magazine, though, star Sydney Sweeney was confident the film is going to be worth the wait, even if she remains sworn to secrecy.
“I couldn’t be more excited. I can’t wait to be able to talk about it. I can’t wait to be able to be next to the girls that I filmed with – Dakota and Isabela, and Celeste. We had so much fun together. And I’m really excited that it’s just gonna be a powerhouse of badass females for the world to see.”
If the uglier side of the online discourse already has their knives sharpened and ready to go for The Marvels – the sequel to one of the MCU’s biggest-earning opening chapters – then Madame Web might be in serious trouble of falling into the same camp of overwrought negativity. Unless of course it turns out to be phenomenal, but it’s not as if Sony has given many reasons to expect that to be the case.
